For centuries, popes have used Constantine`s false donation to bolster the temporal power of the papacy. Among the earliest forgeries were the Anglo-Saxon forgeries, a series of forgeries from the 11th and 12th centuries fabricated by monasteries and abbeys to support a land claim on which the original document had been lost or never existed. A particularly unusual falsification of a primary source was committed by Sir Edward Dering, who placed monumental fake brass sheets in a parish church. [26] In 1986, Hugh Trevor-Roper certified Hitler`s diaries, which later turned out to be forgeries. Recently, forged documents were placed in the British National Archives in the hope of establishing a false origin. [27] [28] However, historians who study the last centuries rarely encounter important fakes. [4]: 22–25 Errors can be corrected in secondary sources, which are often peer-reviewed, well researched, and often written by historians working in institutions where methodological accuracy is important to the future of the author`s career and reputation. Historians consider the accuracy and objectivity of the primary sources they use, and historians subject primary and secondary sources to a high level of scrutiny. A primary source such as a journal entry (or the online version, a blog) can, at best, only reflect a person`s opinion of events, which may or may not be true, accurate, or complete. –Susan H. Veccia, Uncovering Our History: Teaching with Primary Sources. (Chicago: American Library Association, 2004), p.
3. In historiography, when the study of history is subjected to historical examination, a secondary source becomes a primary source. For a biography of a historian, the publications of that historian would be primary sources. Documentaries can be considered a secondary source or a primary source, depending on the extent to which the filmmaker modifies the original sources. [10] Original material may be. Prejudices, or at least not exactly what he claims to be. “A primary source reproduces the words of witnesses or early recorders of an event. Primary sources are manuscripts, archives, letters, diaries and speeches. Secondary sources are “descriptions of the event derived from and based on primary sources.” The line between primary and secondary sources is often blurred, for example, a single document may be a primary source for some topics and a secondary source for others. A story from which the author draws conclusions from non-primary sources or secondary sources that are in fact based on primary sources is, by definition, fiction and not history at all. The Lafayette College Library provides a summary of primary sources in various fields of study: In many fields and contexts, such as historical writing, it is almost always advisable to use primary sources whenever possible, and “if none is available, [the author] may only use secondary sources with great caution.” [6] In addition, primary sources avoid the inherent problem of secondary sources, where any new author can distort and reinterpret the results of the authors cited above.
[13] The following quotes from academics and academic institutions have been selected by historian Justin Lyles to help users understand the concept of primary sources: If you want to learn more about the past, primary sources of information are those that provide first-hand accounts of the events, practices, or conditions you are looking for. Typically, these are documents created by witnesses or early recorders of these events at the time they took place, and include diaries, letters, reports, photographs, creative works, financial records, memos, and newspaper articles (to name a few). While many primary sources remain in private hands, others are found in archives, libraries, museums, historical societies and special collections. These can be public or private. Some are affiliated with universities and colleges, while others are government agencies. Documents related to a domain can be found in many different institutions. These can be removed from the original source of the document. For example, the Huntington Library in California houses many documents from the United Kingdom.
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